Christmas Cracker - The Origins of The Christmas Cracker

The Origins of The Christmas Cracker

The Christmas Cracker was devised in 1847 by an English confectioner and stationery manufacturer, whilst on holiday in Paris with his family. At a time when English sweets were still sold loose from the trays they were made in, his children discovered the Parisian Bon-Bons - coated sugar lollies wrapped in a twist of colored paper - quite a novelty and rather more hygienic he concluded. He liked the idea so much that on his return to England he wrapped his lollies in similar paper and, unwittingly, began the development of his own Bon-Bons.

In the early days, the crackers were called Bon Bons - meaning lollies or candies in French - and as a consequence were still quite small in size with a fairly plain wrapping. Later he added a colored outer wrapper and a friction strip – consisting of two overlapping strips of cardboard coated with a small amount of explosive powder - that is inside all ordinary crackers - and joined together, which became known as a "snap" - because when the cracker is pulled apart the strips rub across each other setting off a chemical reaction that produces an audible bang. The snap was also known as "Silver Fulminante" - a discovery in 1802 by Dottore Luigi Valentino Brugnatelli (1761-1818) Professor of chemistry at Pavia University, Italy.

At the same time - as a confectioner - he would have been familiar with the popular Italian custom of having a surprise "trinket" inside chocolate Easter eggs and also with the ancient Chinese custom of inserting a fortune prediction "motto" inside the fortune cookies.

By putting all these ideas together on his return from the Paris family holiday, the Christmas Cracker was born complete with a surprise novelty gift, a trinket, a tissue paper hat, a snap to make a bang when pulled apart and a piece of paper with a joke or motto - a maxim of appropriate character to express a principle or ideal suited to the occasion.

In those early original crackers, everything was neatly made by hand. Adept cracker makers would assemble the papers, roll, glue and tie off crackers by hand, having put the various novelties etc. into them.

Then they would artistically decorate by hand the outer wrapper with bows and a novelty.

The practice to celebrate Christmas with a decorated Christmas Cracker at each table setting was born and it became a time-honored established tradition passed down continuously from generation to generation of families not only in England but in Great Britain and other parts of the World .

Other manufacturers soon began to imitate Christmas Crackers and by the turn of the century millions of Christmas Crackers were produced annually and with the advent of international distribution the mass production of Christmas Crackers was well on the way.

After more than 150 years, the time-honored tradition of having a Christmas Cracker at each place setting for Christmas still continues.